Walnut Salad Bowl

The son of a very good friend of ours is getting married. Three weeks ago my wife suggested that I make the couple a salad bowl. She doesn’t really get how long it takes to dry a huge chunk of green wood. I’ve been experimenting with a turning technique to go from green to finished in about a month and it has worked very well. This one had to go in two weeks so I would have a week to oil it. The finished bowl is 15” across and 5.5” tall. It started as a sixty pound fresh cut blank. The technique I use is to turn it to 1.25” thick walled and leave it on the lathe. The next day I turn off the warp, both inside and out. I stop cutting as soon as I feel the cold air coming off the bowl, indicating moisture again. I repeat this each day, taking about a thirty-second to a sixteenth of an inch of each day. It cuts away the wood that has dried and warped and exposes new green wood. On very large bowl like this I spray some polyurethane on any knots and on the oldest growth rings closest to the pith (they tend to check if they dry too fast) each day after I’m done cutting. Live tree three weeks ago, salvaged from the mulch site, finished with walnut oil. I’ll post the tongs next.